Jujubee
Aquarium Advice Freak
- Joined
- Oct 24, 2013
- Messages
- 270
I'm a new member after lurking and gathering a bunch of information...now, I'm no pro. I read about the nitrogen cycle and never knew about it before. I decided to set up a 10 gallon aquarium, rather heavily planted (several java fern, Anubis, Amazon sword and one moss ball.) I have only recently set up a planted aquarium for my african dwarf frogs, I have had no experience before about a month ago. So, I set up the aquarium it's going great, I wait a week and the levels seem to be doing well. I added 3 platies sice they were said to be hardy plus I like them, things are great but my ammonia level was around a 3 I had no nitrite and a little nitrate my ph was 7 hardness was low as well. I did a water change and decided after a week to add one more platy. I had two males and two females at that point. Ph shot up as well as hardness, I mean 180+ the water in Virginia is rather hard so I figured it was the water.I decided since hey things are great lets add 3 guppies since it's a planted aquarium lots of hiding places yada yada...I think one of my guppies is stressed (glass surfing) could it be due to space or the ammonia? My fish are eating and swimming just fine they sometimes school but this one fish has got me concerned. My ammonia is still 3 and my nitrites went up. Did I add too many fish at once is my cycle just completing? I love aquatic animals and I just want to do this right.